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BOOKS AND CURRENT LITERATURE 



sium dichromate, copper carbonate, zinc sulphate, magnesium oxide, 

 and potassium chlorate. 



Two atypic forms of mould were seen to originate in the cultures to 

 which potassium, dichromate had been added: one with brownish conidia 

 was named A. fuscus and was carried through forty generations without 

 change: a second to be known as A. cinnamomea, was characterized bj'- 

 conidia colorless at first, which gradually change to sandy then to cin- 

 namon in color. This form was followed through thirty-four genera- 

 tions. Other forms known as A. niger altipes and A. proteus appeared 

 in cultures kept at unusually high temperatures. 



Miss Scieman agrees with Tower and the reviewer that no special 

 connection exists between the nature of the excitation agent and the 

 mutatory reaction. 



It has remained for Col. R. H. Firth of the Royal Army Medical 

 Corps of Great Britain to duplicate the results of the reviewer in obtain- 

 ing atypic 'forms by ovarial treatments of plants.^ Colonel Firth cul- 

 tivated a number of species of Onagraceae in soils to which various sub- 

 stances had been added and in this way saw new forms appear. Then 

 injections into the ovaries of Oenothera odorata (Raimannia odorata), 

 Epilobium roseum and other species resulted in atypic derivatives. Not 

 much success was attained in the cultures of the derived forms at Simla, 

 East India, where the work was performed. Dr. Firth intimates that 

 the induction of forms by ovarial treatment is most easily secured in 

 plants subjected to unusual conditions of cultivation or nourishment, 

 which would support the suggestion mentioned above to the effect that 

 there is no direct relation between the nature of the inciting agent and 

 of the mutations induced. 



It is of interest to note that Dr. Firth induced mutation in Raimannia 

 odorata (Oenothera odorata) in which the discovery of the method was 

 originally made by the reviewer in 1905. Dr. Firth was not aware 

 of the results of the reviewer when he did his own work in ovarial treat- 

 ments in 1909 and 1910 and says "So far as our information goes we 

 believe them to be on original lines. The results are so encouraging that 

 we think them to mark an altogether new step forward in the experi- 

 mental study of the origin of species." — D. T. M. 



A Life of Linnaeus. — ^On May 23, 1909, when the whole scientific 

 world was doing homage to the name and fame of the great Swedish 



' Fil th, R. PL, Jour. Royal Med. Corps, 16: 497-514, 1911. 



